"We must be ready to dare all for our country. For history does not long entrust the care of freedom to the weak or the timid. We must acquire proficiency in defense and display stamina in purpose." - President Eisenhower, First Inaugural Address
Off the Deck
Showing posts with label Sunday Ship History. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Sunday Ship History. Show all posts
The purpose of riverine operations may be to facilitate or prevent river traffic, or the river may be ancillary to the main purpose which is on the banks, not the river itself. Missions may include: naval combat; fire support; landing assault; mine and obstacle removal; reconnaissance; line of communication security; logistics support; ground force movement; line of communication interdiction; raids; patrolling; presence; piracy suppression; smuggling and contraband suppression; suppression of human trafficking (prostitution, slavery, illegal immigration); police support; fishing support; host nation training; vessel recovery; medical support/evacuation; humanitarian aid; and liaison with naval/ground units and local civilians. Trans-axial riverine operations may be categorized by the situations above and include most of the above missions. Historically, the U.S. Army has devoted more thought to crossing rivers than controlling them until confronted with the opportunity to exploit terrain for maneuver, advantage, and supply.
***
Waterways and population centers will be factors in future war. Frequently they will be collocated and will become operational key terrain. They won’t be just the Navy’s, Army’s, Air Force’s, or Marine Corps’ problem. They will affect all services and other departments, bureaus, and agencies of government. Riverine operations will be a part of future military actions and will be an Army problem. The best way to prepare for a future problem is through study, training, and equipment design and development.
Technology will not readily resolve the difficulties of future riverine operations. A major challenge will be developing the leadership that can function effectively in a joint or combined environment and understands the language, culture, employment, capabilities, and limitations of the sister services or international forces involved in riverine actions. Success in future riverine operations begins in the school house of today.(emphasis added)
As is noted in the article, the U.S. has a long history of riverine operations dating back to the Revolutionary War. In places where virtually the only means of access to the interior of a contested land mass is via a river system, knowing that history and learning from it are vital for success of a necessary missions that cannot be accomplished by other means.
While the above- referenced article looks at such operations in the Iraq conflict, an earlier document looked at such operations during the Vietnam War, the most recent large scale such operations undertaken by the U.S. military. That monograph is below, but can also be found at the Army History site. Other discussions of riverine and inshore operations have been part of the Sunday Ship History series, see Operation Game Warden and Operation Market Time.
The following document ties in with a previous look at the salvage operation that followed the attack on Pearl Harbor in December 1941 Sunday Ship History: After Pearl Harbor - Down but not out. The importance of recovering ships and equipment in the early days of U.S. involvement in WWII is noted there:
On October 25, 1944, at the seminal battle of Surigao Strait, the battleships USS Mississippi, USS Maryland, USS West Virginia, USS Tennessee, USS California and USS Pennsylvania "crossed the T" of a Japanese fleet in the last great surface ship engagement.
Of the six battleships of the U.S. Navy involved in the action, five had been either sunk or damaged during the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor.
Salvage operations deserve a much longer look, and happily, the U.S. Navy's History and Heritage Command published a such a treatment in 2009, Mud, Muscle, and Miracles: Marine Salvage in the United States Navy by Captain Charles A. Bartholomew, USN and Commander William I. Milwee, Jr., USN (Ret.).
In an earlier post, we took a look at Operation Market Time which was meant to halt the influx of weapons and other supplies by sea into South Vietnam. Operation Game Warden was initiated to cover the inland waters of parts of South Vietnam, as set out at the Navy History and Heritage Command Operation Game Warden: Keeping Shipping Channels Open
In 1965, the Military Assistance Command, Vietnam (MACV) recognized that the enemy was supplying Viet Cong units via the Ho Chi Minh Trail and Cambodia. In December of that year, the Navy established the River Patrol Force (Task Force 116) to keep shipping channels open, search river craft, disrupt enemy troop movements, and support special operations and ground forces. Operation Game Warden limited the enemy’s use of South Vietnam’s larger rivers.
Below is a study of Game Warden prepared at the Navy's request by the Center for Naval Analysis in 1976. Before reading that report, it is worth reviewing some comments on the nature of the U.S. Navy's involvement with riverine warfare as set out here:
To our small initial Navy section of the Military Assistance and Advisory Group, Vietnam, we gradually added stronger coastal forces, rapidly increased the number of river patrol and minesweeping craft, and introduced a river assault force to give three major U.S. Navy combatant task forces in Vietnam. Also during the period of build up of U.S. Navy strength in Vietnam, the Vietnamese Navy itself was growing in coastal and river patrol, river assault, and logistics capabilities with the help of U.S. Navy advisors. In late 1968 operations were begun that combined the capabilities of all three major U.S. Navy task forces, the Vietnamese Navy, and other Free World ground and air forces to strike at enemy strongholds and interdict enemy supply routes. In addition to the combat operations on the many waterways of Vietnam, hundreds of large and small U.S. and Vietnamese Navy logistics craft form a vital link in the flow of supplies to allied forces at remote bases.
Riverine warfare is an extension of sea power. By controlling the high seas the Navy can project its strength along the inland waterways into the heart of enemy territory.
One of the interesting aspects of the Vietnam War was the substantial naval effort to stop the sea transport of arms and other material to enemy forces in South Vietnam. This effort include aircrat, naval and Coast Guard vessels. As set out in Operation Market Time it was largely successful in cutting off the supply from the sea.
The Navy established Operation Market Time (March 1965-1972) to prevent North Vietnamese ships from supplying enemy forces in South Vietnam by sea. The Coastal Surveillance Force (Task Force 115) used a system of three barriers to patrol the South Vietnamese coast. Patrol aircraft covered the outermost barrier to identify, photograph, and report suspicious vessels and U.S. Coast Guard cutters stopped and searched cargo vessels in the middle barrier forty miles off the coast. The South Vietnamese Navy, the Junk Force, and U.S. Navy Patrol Craft Fast (PCF( Swift boats cruised the coastal waters of the inner barriers. By 1968, these forces stopped virtually all seaborne infiltration from North Vietnam to South Vietnam. The blockade forced the North Vietnamese to rely on the Ho Chi Minh Trail and the Cambodian port of Sihanoukville to transport supplies to the Viet Cong.
A longer history and analysis of Market Time can be found at the U.S. Navy History and Heritage Command here in a paper prepared by Judith C. Erdheim of the Center for Naval Analysis in 1975. That report follows below.
Update2: A 1970 fight between Market Time wooden hulled U.S. Navy minesweeper USS Endurance (MSO-435) and a metal hulled NV trawler in the "Sea Battle off the Cua Co Chien River" as depicted by Richard DeRosset as used in part as the cover illustration for David Bruhn's Wooden Ships and Iron Men: The U.S. Navy's Ocean Minesweepers, 1953–1994:
The year 1779 opens with the departure of the Alliance, 32, for France. It has already been stated that the command of this ship had been given to a Captain Landais, who was said to be a French officer of gallantry and merit. Unfortunately the prejudices of the seamen did not answer to the complaisance of the Marine Committee in this respect, and it was
found difficult to obtain a crew willing to enlist under a French captain. When General Lafayette reached Boston near the close of 1778, in order to embark in the Alliance, it was found that the frigate was not yet manned. Desirous of rendering themselves useful to their illustrious guest, the government of Massachusetts offered to complete the ship's complement by impressment, an expedient that had been adopted on more than one occasion during the war ; but the just-minded and benevolent Lafayette would not consent to the measure. Anxious to sail, however, for he was entrusted with important interests, recourse was had to a plan to man the ship, which, if less objectionable on the score of principle, was scarcely less so in every other point of view.
The Somerset 64, had been wrecked on the coast of New England, and part of her crew had found their way to Boston. By accepting the proffered services of these men, those of some
volunteers from among the prisoners, and those of a few French seamen that were also found in Boston after the departure of their fleet, a motley number was raised in sufficient
time to enable the ship to sail on the 11th of January. With this incomplete and mixed crew, Lafayette trusted himself on the ocean, and the result was near justifying the worst forebodings
that so ill-advised a measure could have suggested.
After a tempestuous passage, the Alliance got within two days' run of the English coast, when her officers and passengers, of the latter of whom there were many besides General
Lafayette and his suite, received the startling information that a conspiracy existed among the English portion of the crew, some seventy or eighty men in all, to kill the officers, seize the
vessel, and carry the frigate into England. With a view to encourage such acts of mutiny, the British Parliament had passed a law to reward all those crews that should run away
with American ships ; and this temptation was too strong for men whose service, however voluntary it might be in appearances, was probably reluctant, and which had been compelled
by circumstances, if not by direct coercion.
The plot, however, was betrayed, and by the spirited conduct of the officers and passengers, the ringleaders were arrested.
On reaching Brest, the mutineers were placed in a French gaol, and after some delay, were exchanged as prisoners of war, without any other punishment; the noble-minded Lafayette,
in particular, feeling averse to treating foreigners as it would have been a duty to treat natives under similar circumstances.
The preceding document was declassified pursuant to DOD DIR 5200.9 and can be found at the Naval History and Heritage Command here and at UNC's Ibiblio Hyperwar site here. Ibiblio notes that
All software, documentation, research data, and other materials (Materials) submitted for installation on the ibiblio.org Internet Server will be deemed in the public domain, except for any express restrictions included in such Materials by the submitting party.
Most Americans don't have knowledge of the 1950's Korean War or its background.
Few know that Japan annexed Korea starting in 1910 after a 1905 treaty which made Korea a protectorate of Japan.
At the end of WWII, Soviet Russia gained control of what is North Korea and American forces took over South
Korea, with the 38th parallel being the dividing line.
On June 25, 1950, North Korean forces invaded South Korea and drove very deep into South Korea, by early August only leaving what became known as the "Pusan Perimeter" in U.S. and South Korean hands.
In order to relieve the pressure on the Pusan Perimeter in early September 1950, General MacArthur, acting as UN Command, organized an successful amphibious assault on Inchon ("Operation Chromite"), "110 miles behind enemy lines" (see here) in one of the most amazing feat of arms ever accomplished.
The success of MacArthur's plan was reliant on a strong and coordinated sea, air, and land force. The Inchon invasion demonstrated how naval forces can be a decisive factor in littoral operations. The 230 ships of Vice Admiral Arthur D. Struble's Joint Task Force (JTF) 7, with the aid of Royal Navy and other Allied warships, established superiority in the Yellow Sea as well as the air over it. The continued presence of U.S. and Allied naval forces acted as a deterrent to Soviet and/or Chinese intervention. The element of surprise was essential to Operation Chromite.
On 13 September 1950, the naval forces in JTF 7 led by Admirals Struble and James H. Doyle, began their attack against Inchon. Carrier-based aircraft squadrons, destroyers, and cruisers battered North Korea's fortifications, coastal artillery batteries, and supply points for two days. On 15 September, 1st Marine Division assaulted three beaches and quickly seized Inchon. General MacArthur signaled that "the Navy and Marines... never shone more brightly" than at Inchon.
By 19 September, the Marines had captured Kimpo air base, into which flowed Marine close support aircraft and U.S. Air Force supply transports. U.S. Army troops advanced from the beachhead and linked up with their comrades advancing north from the Pusan perimeter. Marine, Army, and South Korean troops captured Seoul on 28 September 1950.
Another phase of the war began in October 1950, with a planned amphibious assault at Wonsan on North Korea's east coast which left the U.S. Navy and its allies with a valuable lesson as set out below:
The great success of the Inchon Invasion led General MacArthur to order a second amphibious assault, targeting Wonsan on North Korea's east coast. After landing there, Tenth Corps could advance inland, link up with the Eighth Army moving north from Seoul and hasten the destruction of the North Korean army. Wonsan would also provide UN forces with another logistics support seaport, one closer to the battlefronts than Pusan and with greater handling capacity than tide-encumbered Inchon.
Since the enemy army's coherence collapsed much more rapidly than expected, by the Wonsan operation's planned execution date of 20 October 1950, its immediate strategic goals had been overtaken by events. However, the forces landed there proved valuable in the push up North Korea's east side, and the captured port did fulfill its intended mission.
Wonsan's greatest value, though, was unintended: it gave the U.S. Navy a painfully valuable reminder of the fruits of neglecting mine countermeasures, that unglamorous side of maritime power that, when it is needed, is needed very badly. As Admiral Forrest Sherman, the Chief of Naval Operations at the time, remarked "when you can't go where you want to, when you want to, you haven't got command of the sea". This experience provoked one of the greatest minesweeper building programs in the Navy's history, one that produced hundreds of ships to serve not only under the U.S. flag, but under those of many allied nations. (emphasis added)
At the time, the lesson was painfully learned by the damage to or loss of ships. Not all damage was caused by mines - the risk of inshore operation from gun batteries has been well known for hundreds of years, but it came back in 1950.
USS Magpie (AMS-25) blew up after striking a mine off the coast of Korea on Sept. 29 1950,
claiming the lives of 21 members of the crew. Ships hitting mines during the Korean Conflict would also cost the U.S. Navy the USS Pirate (AM-275), USS Pledge (AM-277), USS Sarsi (ATF-111) and USS Partridge (AMS-31). Mines continue to be the biggest threat to the world’s navies and account for most ship losses other than accidents.
Another 87 ships were damaged, either by mines or by engagement with shore batteries with last damage occurring in 1953.
Now, about that lesson regarding mine warfare . . .
Another aspect of the Navy's involvement in the Korean War was the sea-borne evacuation of both military units and civilians from North Korea after the Chinese Army entered the war in massive numbers. As set out in Edward J. Marolda's The Hungnam and Chinnampo Evacuations:
The Hungnam Evacuation by the U.S. Navy from North Korea of troops under the U.S. X Corps, including the U.S. 1st Marine Division, 7th Infantry Division, and 3d Infantry Division, and the Republic of Korea I Corps, including the 3d and Capital Infantry Divisions, took place from December 9 to 24, 1950. When the People's Republic of China intervened in the Korean War in late November 1950, its 250,000 ground forces threatened to cut off and destroy UN units operating in the mountains of North Korea. To prevent that catastrophe and to concentrate UN units in more easily defended terrain further south, on December 9 General Douglas MacArthur, Commander in Chief, United Nations Command, ordered evacuation by sea of the U.S. X Corps.
Vice Admiral C. Turner Joy, Commander Naval Forces, Far East, had already alerted Rear Admiral James H. Doyle, his amphibious commander, to prepare for such a contingency and begun deploying naval forces to waters off Hungnam on the east coast of North Korea. He dispatched other units, under Rear Admiral Lyman A. Thackrey, to Korea's west coast to handle evacuation from Chinnampo and Inchon, in company with British, Australian, and Canadian ships, of U.S. Eighth Army and allied forces. The mission at Chinnampo was accomplished between the 4th and 6th of December, although most of the allied forces made their way south in vehicles or on foot. In addition, during December and early January 1951, Thackrey's ships pulled 69,000 military personnel, 64,000 refugees, 1,000 vehicles, and more than 55,000 tons of cargo out of Inchon.
As the marines and soldiers, in biting cold and wind, fought their way out of encirclement at Chosin Reservoir and elsewhere in northeast Korea during December, several hundred Navy and Marine aircraft operating from airfields ashore and from the ships of Task Force 77 (aircraft carriers Philippine Sea, Leyte, Princeton, and Valley Forge, light carrier Bataan, and escort carriers Sicily and Baedong Strait) pummelled enemy ground troops. Other U.S. planes airdropped supplies. Conducting round-the-clock air operations from snow and wind-swept carrier decks and from unimproved airstrips ashore demanded the most of the sailors and marines working feverishly to help bring their comrades out of the frozen hills of North Korea.
***
In an orderly fashion, on December 10th the ships under Rear Admiral Doyle, Commander Amphibious Force, Far East (Task Force 90), began embarking the withdrawing ground troops and their equipment from Hungnam (and some ROK 3d Division troops from Wonsan further to the south). The marines, who had endured the hardest fighting, were the first men to board the evacuation ships. They were followed by the ROK units on the 17th and the U.S. Army divisions during the third week of December. By Christmas Eve 1950, Task Force 90 had embarked 105,000 military personnel, 17,500 tanks and other vehicles, 350,000 measurement tons of cargo, and 91,000 Korean civilians. Marine and Air Force transports airlifted out another 3,600 troops, 196 vehicles, and 1,300 tons of cargo.
Generally described as an "amphibious operation in reverse", the evacuation of Hungnam encompassed the safe withdrawal of the bulk of UN forces in eastern North Korea. It was the largest sealift since the 1945 Okinawa operation. In barely two weeks, over a hundred-thousand military personnel, 17,500 vehicles and 350,000 measurement tons of cargo were pulled out. In comparison with the retreat in central and western Korea, little was left behind. Even broken-down vehicles were loaded and lifted out. Also departing North Korea through Hungnam were some 91,000 refugees, a large number, but not nearly as many as had gathered to leave.
These evacuations were not only carried out by U.S. forces, but by chartered merchant ships, and by allied ships, including but not limited to Japanese manned LSTs.
There were a total of 40 LSTs and 75 marine transports used during the evacuation of Hungnam. All ships making multiple trips from Hungnam and Wonsan to various ports in southern Korea and parts of Japan.
Early in my research I managed to find a list of US LSTs involved in the Korean War – some 40 LSTs. As part of this process I also found that a lot of Japanese and a few Korean LSTs were used. There were a total 40 LSTs used at Hungnam, 11 US, a large number of Japanese LSTs and a few Korean.
The importance of the evacuation is well stated in the following video:
This resumption of Sunday Ship History posts begins with Commander Thomas Selfridge taking the 1874 version of USS Enterprise into the Amazon basin in 1878 and his report to the Secretary of the Navy, which can be found at the U.S. Navy's Naval History and Heritage website at Survey of the Amazon- Selfridge
...No nation is more directly interested in the prosperity of Brazil than ourselves. Our geographical situation brings us nearer than Europe, and her coffee, sugar, and raw products of the forest we need in exchange for the manufactures and food we can furnish to her agricultural population. * * *
***
In 1867 Brazil declared the Amazon open to the commerce of the world. But there is not much inducement to take advantage of this liberality, for the present steam tonnage is too large for a profitable business; and so far from being an opening to the flags of foreign nations, it is my opinion that some of the present force will have to be withdrawn unless the railway project around the falls of the Madeira proves a success.
***
Though generally known under the sole name of Amazon, this magnificent river, at least twice the size of any other in the world in volume, not excepting the Mississippi, is locally divided into three parts under different names. The Amazon proper extends to its juncture with the Negro, near Manaos, the capital of Amazonas, 874 miles from the sea. From this point to the Peruvian frontier at Tabatinga, 1,000 miles away, it is known as the Solimocus and in Peru as the Maranon. Either of its two large tributaries in Peru, the Ucayali or the Huallaga might lay claim in size to be the parent river, but at Nauta the junction of the Ucayali and Maranon Rivers, it becomes then immeasurably and incomparably the peer of all others. As far as the function of the Tio Negro it is navigable for a line-of-battle ship at all seasons of the year. There is, however, one point about 10 miles below the Negro where a ledge or rocks extends across, on which it is said there is found but 18 feet of water at extreme low water, but I doubt the accuracy of it, for at the time I passed over this spot there was a depth of 36 feet.
***
It has been shown time and again that the United States is the commercial ally of brazil. We can furnish everything the country requires, and as cheaply and of better quality than those of Europe. But the entire lack of facilities has turned the channel of trade completely from us. It is estimated that on an average there is at least an arrival of one steamer a day in Brazil from England.
It is vitally necessary, if the United States will take its share of the foreign business of Brazil, to create avenues of trade by which such will flow to our shores.
These are first of all a well-established steam line, with feeders to different ports. Such line must in its infancy be fostered by the government in order to compete with the old established European lines, until the trade directed by them to our country will enable them to take care of themselves.
There should be direct telegraphic communication between the two countries. To the energy of our own countrymen we are indebted for the first successful Atlantic cable, and why cannot one be laid to Brazil?
A bank through which exchanges could be favorably made is also very necessary for the easy flow of commerce.
I would strongly urge upon those American firms that manufacture or sell goods required by Brazil that they should act in concert, and establish sample houses in the important centers of trade. They should be represented by enterprising agents, speaking the language and acquainted with the wants of the country. Such should be encouraged by liberal commissions rather than salaries.
Our products can better be introduced in this manner through native houses than by attempting to establish large concerns in rivalry with them. But especially it must be remembered that steam communication is absolutely necessary first of all, no matter how high and excellent our manufactories may be.
All of which is a reminder of one of the great missions of a strong navy - to visit other countries, show the flag, and share knowledge. Or, as a fictional Enterprise had it, "To seek out new life and new civilizations. To boldly go where no one has gone before!"
FIREPOWER OFF VIETNAM aka AMERICAN ROCKET SHIPS BOMBARD VIETNAM
British Pathe (click on image to go to video) That's USS Carronade (IFS-1) shown in the latter video. More about her here:
USS Carronade (IFS-1/LFR-1) was a ship of the United States Navy first commissioned in 1955. She is named after the carronade, a type of short barrelled cannon. As an Inshore Fire Support Ship (IFS), part of the so-called "brown-water navy", Carronade was built to provide direct naval gunfire support to amphibious landings or operations close to shore. Carronade was armed with two twin 40mm anti-aircraft mounts (mounted fore and aft of the superstructure), one dual-purpose 5" .38caliber naval cannon, and eight mk.105 twin automatic rocket launchers. Each launcher was capable of firing thirty spin-stabilized rockets per minute. *** During the Vietnam War, Carronade served as the Flagship of Inshore Fire Support Division 93 (IFSDIV93), working alongside the USS Clarion River (LSM(R)-409), USS St. Francis River (LSMR-525) and USS White River (LSMR-536). Shortly before decommissioning, all ships in IFSDIV93 were re-designated as LFR.
To a certain extent, Carronade and her companions were meant to satisfy US Marine Corps needs for amphibious gunfire support.
USS G-1, a 400-ton Lake type submarine, was built at Newport News, Virginia. Launched with the name Seal, she was renamed G-1 in November 1911 and commissioned in October 1912. Her first years of service were spent operating with the Atlantic Torpedo Flotilla, including a cruise off the East Coast in March-May 1915. From the middle of that year, she was employed in experimental and training duties in the Long Island Sound area, operating out of the New London Submarine Base, Groton, Connecticut. During 1918 she also briefly conducted anti-submarine patrols in that vicinity. USS G-1 was decommissioned in March 1920 and expended in depth charge tests in June 1921.
Photo credit to NavSource which posted it with this comment: "Photo Submarine Force Museum and Library and submitted by Robert Hurst."
Among other wrinkles in the 19 1/2 design were wheels for "bottom crawling."
. . . two of Lake's most characteristic design features - hull-mounted wheels for bottom crawling and "level diving" by means of amidships hydroplanes - became an intriguing "road not traveled" in the evolution of submarine design. *** Lake's 1893 design, for which he applied for a patent in April of that year, reflected his early interest in developing submarines primarily for commercial purposes, and particularly for marine salvage. It was intended to submerge on an even keel using a combination of judicious ballasting and horizontal control planes and to operate largely on the ocean bottom using a set of powered wheels for propulsion.
More about that 19 1/2:
Built under a subcontract with Newport News Shipbuilding in fiscal year 1908, USS Seal (later G-1) was Lake's first U.S. Navy submarine - and after 19 predecessors, the first U.S. submarine not built by Holland and/or Electric Boat. Clearly an afterthought, she was later designated SS-19 1/2 a source of some amusement to Lake and his colleagues. Seal was launched in February 1911 and commissioned in October of the following year. In design, she was very similar to the Kaimans that Lake had built for Russia, and at 516 tons and 161 feet long, she was essentially intended for harbor defense or coastal patrols. As built, Seal had Lake's customary wheels, amidships planes, and an airlock, as well as trainable (external) torpedo tubes mounted in the superstructure. Her twin screws were powered by four 300-horsepower gasoline engines (two in tandem on each shaft) and 375- horsepower electric motors. Although Seal was a notoriously slow diver, and her tandem engines caused recurring breakdowns until one of the two on each shaft was removed in 1916, she squeaked through her trials, and Lake was paid.
Design Sketch NR-1 - note the wheels
Just as a point of interest, the U.S. research submarine NR-1 also was equipped with "bottom crawling" wheels - well, "bottoming" wheels.
After Korea, before the mines of the Arabian Gulf hit Samuel B. Roberts, Princeton and Tripoli, one ship* of the United States Navy took a couple a mine hits and, through heroic effort her crew, was brought into port afloat and with no loss of life. Perhaps because the incident was deemed one of "friendly fire" (the ship was either in the wrong place or the mines were not where they were supposed to be), less is heard of the saving of USS Warrington (DD-843) in July, 1972.
Warrington was an East Coast destroyer, a FRAM Gearing-Class, completed shortly before the end of WWII. Brought through the Panama Canal to help with Naval Gunfire Support off Vietnam, following the Easter Invasion by the North Vietnamese down the South Vietnamese coast. On July 17, 1972, Warrington had been on the gun line in the morning.
As part of Operation Pocket Money, much of the navigable water of inshore North Vietnam had been mined by aerial mining:
By the end of the year Navy and Marine Corps bombers had dropped more than eight thousand mines in North Vietnamese coastal waters and three thousand in inland waterways
As you might imagine, some mines may not have ended up exactly where intended.
Warrington may have stumbled upon a couple of such outlier mines:
USS Warrington was irreparably damaged when it detonated what was believed to be
After the mine hit
mislaid mines 20 miles (32 km) north of Đồng Hới on 17 July 1973. (ND E1: Wrong date by a year Wikipedia!)
There were a small number of injuries to the crew, resulting in the award of 5 Purple Hearts.
Flooding, bent equipment, loss of power. Damage control parties. Restoration of enough steam power to get the ship moving offshore. Well-trained crew saves the ship - just enough.
Assistance from other ships, fleet tug arrives, tows the ship to Subic Bay. In Subic, at the ammo piers, she is brought alongside USS Pyro (AE-24) where the Pyro crew feed them warm food and help off-load Warrington's munitions.
Warrington then heads to the drydock and the decision is made that she is not worth repairing. She is sold to Taiwan and her parts cannibalized.
Sure, no one died - but the crew of Warrington deserves a great deal of credit. And, after all these years, a little praise for a job well done.
Photos from the various sites linked herein. They are worth a visit.
*There is an indication here that USS King (DLG-10) also had a mine strike during the Vietnam War, but a time line of the King's operations makes no reference to a "mine strike" although it is reported here that she had a boiler casualty in 1969, well before the mining operation. Neither is there a report, of USS John King (DDG-3) ever hitting a mine during the 1972-3 time frame. Dr. Truver has far more expertise in such matters than I do, but I know for a certainty about Warrington.
Back in October 2007, I laid out the post that follows. Today, I am pleased to say, I received a comment on that post from Art Sahlstein (a nephew of one of the Quail survivors) advising me that the book on which the post was largely based has been reprinted by a couple of brothers from South Carolina, and the book is now available - with some new illustrations - from Amazon here. Perhaps it is fitting that we just celebrated Memorial Day and are rounding turn toward Father's Day because this book would make a great gift for any father interested in real tales of heroism. Heck, it would have been a great book to read to my sons and daughters when they were little. Fighting orcs and evil wizards in fantasy is one thing - courage under the stress of real fire - well, that's something else completely. What follows is the original post, though I have updated it to make sure the quoted material is clearly distinguished from my own. Enjoy!
A couple of months ago, I got an email from Sid, a reader of this blog- and of CDR Salamander's blog.
Sid pointed me to a comment left at Salamander's place and to a photo of a motley looking crew of sailors. Nineteen members of the crew of USS Quail, Sid said, noting he thought there might be a tale of some interest to me behind that picture.
And so I looked behind that picture.
In the early days of December 1941, after the attack on Pearl Harbor, the Japanese began their assault on the Philippines, slowing forcing the Americans and their Philippine allied forces onto the peninsula of Bataan, a finger stuck between Manila Bay and Subic Bay. And onto the island of Corregidor (the "Rock") which dominated the entrance to Manila Bay, along with some lesser forts on adjacent islands. The joint forces held on, sustained by a hope, dwindling daily, that the American fleet was soon to steam over the horizon and rescue her troops and allies from the invaders.
As the battle raged, some of the remnants of the U.S. Asiatic Fleet fought on, including Quail. Not especially attractive ships, these sweeps could do 14 knots and possessed a pair of 3"/50 guns. But they were fighting ships. They laid mines to block access to Manila Bay and cleared channels for submarines to get to Corregidor.
In addition to the mine sweepers, there were small gunboats, which undertook missions which stretched them beyond their limits. One such gunboat was Mindinao whose Commanding Officer was Cdr. Alan R. McCracken. Here is a description of the gunboat's efforts against Japanese shore batteries:
"Gathering speed as she went, the Mindinao slid along the coastline, zigzagging. Holding her fire until she reached a position between the Jap batteries and the Keswick, she opened up and pounded the daylights out of those batteries. It seemed utter recklessnes, and we held her breath for her. We should have known it was a waste of time to worry about her skipper, McCracken. In not time at all he blew the batteries all to hell and maneuvered his ship alongside the Keswick to rescue her crew. It was an maneuver which called for fearlessness and McCracken did it without thinking, as naturally as he would blink an eye. He rated a decoration for it, but time worked against him and the records of his exploit were destroyed when Corregidor fell."*
Yes, Corregidor fell and the Asiatic surface fleet was nearly completely destroyed. Mine sweeper Quail's fate summed up as:
Damaged by Japanese bombs and guns, USS Quail (Lt.Cdr. J.H. Morrill) was scuttled, 5 May 1942 at Corregidor.
Ah, Lt.Cdr. Morrill... the author of the words above about Mindinao and a footnote to history. Literally, on page 206 of Samuel Eliot Morison's History of United States Naval Operations in World War II:
25. South from Corregidor...A remarkable 29-day voyage by Lt.Cdr. J.H. Morrill, one other officer and 16 men of Quail was made in an open 36-foot motor launch to Darwin, Australia
South from Corregidor was the book authored by Lt.Cdr. Morrill about those ragamuffins in that boat.
Quite honestly, I am astonished to never have heard of the book before having found a copy at a local university library, and reading it in full, it is a truly great story of men of the sea of which the 29-day voyage is but a small part. Morrill and his men were warriors. Describing the effort to scuttle his ship:
"We were as puny and hopeless an expedition as ever took off from any shore anywhere. There we were - one man who couldn't swim, another to whom the undertaking was excruciating agony, and myself - headed out through a patch of water in which dive bombers were stitching fancy patterns...
And on the decision to take the boat and head through enemy controlled water, when he polled his crew, all of who had been fighting the Japanese virtually non-stop for 5 months:
Eleven of them piped up without any waiting and said "We're all with you, Captain. Let's go." The rest hung back, among them men for whom I have a great deal of respect. One of them was a petty officer. He summed it up for the ones who decided to stay. "I want to go," he said, "but I just haven't got the heart to make any more effort. I placed all my faith in the Rock not surrendering and now that it has, it just seems the bottom has fallen out of everything." His voice was dead, the voice of a man utterly without hope. It made me want to weep to hear it. It was heartbreaking.
And so Morrill and those who chose to sail with him dodged the Japanese and made it to Darwin. The map of the route they followed is nearby.
Morrill's war was not over.
But that's a tale for another Sunday.
*Actually, Cdr. McCracken was awarded a Navy Cross for his efforts:
The Navy Cross is presented to Alan Reed McCracken, Commander, U.S. Navy, for extraordinary heroism in action from 7 December 1941 to 28 April 1942, while serving as Commanding Officer of the U.S.S. MINDANAO (PR-8) in the Philippines. His conduct throughout was in keeping with the highest traditions of the Navy of the United States.
And for his early efforts , so was Morrill:
The Navy Cross is presented to John H. Morrill, Lieutenant Commander, U.S. Navy, for extraordinary heroism and distinguished service in the line of his profession Commanding Officer of the U.S.S. Quail (AM- 15) in combat against enemy Japanese forces during the bombardment of Cavite Navy Yard, Philippine Islands, on 10 December 1941. Despite the fires and frequent explosion of air flasks and war heads, Lieutenant Commander Morrill while in command of a small auxiliary craft, displayed extraordinary courage and determination in proceeding into the danger zone and towing disabled surface craft alongside docks to a safe zone. This prompt and daring action undoubtedly saved the crews from serious danger and saved the vessels aided for further war service. The conduct of Lieutenant Commander Morrill throughout this action reflects great credit upon himself, and was in keeping with the highest traditions of the United States Naval Service.
At the start of the American Revolution, George Washington was aware of one great weakness of the colonists. They had no fleet. They could not cut off British troop movements by sea. They could not stop British resupply of its forces. The American's major cities were all coastal - and the British could strike them at will. Washington urged the growth of a navy to challenge control of American waters by the British fleet. As set out in The Pivot Upon Which Everything Turned: French Naval Superiority That Ensured Victory At Yorktown:
Washington did not swerve from what was to him a fundamental principle --"whatever efforts are made by the Land Armies, the Navy must have the casting vote in the present contest." He sought every opportunity to urge a true naval superiority.
The French finally did send a strong force under Admiral Francois Joseph Paul, Comte de Grasse. This force, composed of 28 ships-of-the-line and 3000 troops had arrived in the Chesapeake Bay at the end of August 1781.
What followed, on September 5, 1781, off the Virgina Capes, was a sea skirmish that effectively sealed the victory of the Americans in their revolution.
To set the picture. Lord Cornwallis and his forces had left the Carolinas (after battles at Cowpens and Guilford Courthouse) and invaded Virginia. American forces and forces led by Wayne and Lafayette were in pursuit. Cornwallis headed for the peninsula on which Yorktown lay.
But, unknown to Cornwallis, a major French fleet was underway towards North America.
In the six months between August 1942 and February 1943, the United States and its Pacific Allies fought a brutally hard air-sea-land campaign against the Japanese for possession of the previously-obscure island of Guadalcanal. The Allies' first major offensive action of the Pacific War, the contest began as a risky enterprise since Japan still maintained a significant naval superiority in the Pacific ocean.
Nevertheless, the U.S. First Marine Division landed on 7 August 1942 to seize a nearly-complete airfield at Guadalcanal's Lunga Point and an anchorage at nearby Tulagi, bounding a picturesque body of water that would soon be named "Iron Bottom Sound". Action ashore went well, and Japan's initial aerial response was costly and unproductive. However, only two days after the landings, the U.S. and Australian navies were handed a serious defeat in the Battle of Savo Island.
A lengthy struggle followed, with its focus the Lunga Point airfield, renamed Henderson Field. Though regularly bombed and shelled by the enemy, Henderson Field's planes were still able to fly, ensuring that Japanese efforts to build and maintain ground forces on Guadalcanal were prohibitively expensive. Ashore, there was hard fighting in a miserable climate, with U.S. Marines and Soldiers, aided by local people and a few colonial authorities, demonstrating the fatal weaknesses of Japanese ground combat doctrine when confronted by determined and well-trained opponents who possessed superior firepower.
At sea, the campaign featured two major battles between aircraft carriers that were more costly to the Americans than to the Japanese, and many submarine and air-sea actions that gave the Allies an advantage. Inside and just outside Iron Bottom Sound, five significant surface battles and several skirmishes convincingly proved just how superior Japan's navy then was in night gunfire and torpedo combat. With all this, the campaign's outcome was very much in doubt for nearly four months and was not certain until the Japanese completed a stealthy evacuation of their surviving ground troops in the early hours of 8 February 1943.
At the end of the old Victory at Sea episode the narration compares the Marines on Guadalcanal to the Greeks at Thermopylae, the English at Waterloo.
The Marines turned the tide of war and stopped their enemy. The Japanese will advance no further. And, as the surviving Marines wave goodbye, one of the greatest tales of heroism slips out of focus - into history. For these men go the honors accorded to the Greeks at Thermopylae, the Colonials at Valley Forge, the British at Waterloo and, now, the Americans at Guadalcanal.
And what of the American Navy? It began badly as Japanese land-based aircraft ripped into the shipboard logistics train followed by a sea battle that shook the fleet:
The long fight for Guadalcanal formally opened shortly after 6AM on 7 August 1942, when the heavy cruiser Quincy began bombarding Japanese positions near Lunga Point.
In the darkness a few hours earlier, what was for mid-1942 an impressive invasion force had steamed past Savo Island to enter the sound between the two objective areas: Guadalcanal to the south and, less than twenty miles away, Tulagi to the north. These thirteen big transports (AP), six large cargo ships (AK) and four small high-speed transports (APD) carried some 19,000 U.S. Marines. They were directly protected by eight cruisers (three of them Australian), fifteen destroyers and five high-speed minesweepers (DMS).
Led by Rear Admiral Richmond Kelly Turner, this armada was supported from out at sea by three aircraft carriers, accompanied by a battleship, six cruisers, sixteen destroyers and five oilers under the command of Vice Admiral Frank Jack Fletcher, who was also entrusted with the overall responsibility for the operation.
The great majority of these ships (9 AP, 6 AK and most of the escort and bombardment ships), with Marine Major General Alexander A. Vandegrift and the bulk of his Leathernecks, was to assault Guadalcanal a few miles east of Lunga Point. Tactically, this part of the landing went very well. There were few enemy combat troops present, and these were some distance away. The first of the Marines came ashore soon after 9AM at "Red" Beach, a stretch of grey sand near the Tenaru River. By the afternoon of the following day they had pushed westwards to seize the operation's primary object, the nearly completed Japanese airfield near Lunga Point. The surviving Japanese, mainly consisting of labor troops, quickly retreated up the coast and inland, leaving the Marines with a bounty of captured materiel, much of which would soon prove very useful to its new owners.
Low flying Japanese bombers attack the fleet of ships supporting the invasion of Guadalcanal
While the Marines consolidated their beachhead and began to establish a defensive perimeter around the airstrip, the landing of their supplies and equipment proceeded less well. Typically for these early amphibious operations, arrangements were inadequate to handle the glut of things brought ashore by landing craft. Mounds of supplies soon clogged the beaches, slowing the unloading of the ships offshore. A series of Japanese air attacks, which forced the ships to get underway to evade them, didn't help, and when the catastrophic outcome to the Battle of Savo Island and the withdrawal of Vice Admiral Fletcher's carriers forced the the big transports and cargo ships to leave on 9 August, none of them had been completely unloaded. Though the Marines had taken their objective, supply shortages would plague them in the coming weeks, as the Japanese hit back by air, sea and land in an increasingly furious effort to recover Guadalcanal's strategically important airfield.
The fleet withdrawal has been a sore spot in Navy and Marine relations for years. As this series proceeds, I think you will see that the Navy paid in full any IOUs it owed to the Marines as a result of that forced evacuation. And paid them with blood and raw courage of the highest order.
Interesting historical piece about an early experiement in racial integration in a wartime vessel at Racial Integration for Naval Efficiency by Cdr. Carlton Skinner, USCGR(ret):
The proposal had to be and was based solely on military and naval effectiveness. This was because, first, that was the origin of the idea; second, because I was sure that it was the only legitimate basis for considering a plan for racial integration of the armed forces during wartime. Everyone forgets to a greater or lesser extent the progress that has been made socially in this country in the area of race relations in the years since World War II. The big civil rights programs started with President Truman. I did not consciously think of the program as a "civil rights" program. It was to me a program for increased military effectiveness. It will be remembered that President Franklin Roosevelt, basically a liberal on social issues, said during the war that Dr. New Deal has been replaced by Dr. Win The War.
To bring about the use of Negroes in seagoing units in their best skills required a change in the rule of the Coast Guard and Navy that Negroes would not be accepted for or assigned to general ratings. It could be said that they had to be emancipated from the officer's servant status. But, it was equally clear to me that this could not be done merely by changing the rule. The rule was encrusted with tradition. It was based on long experience that, in general, Negroes joining the Coast Guard or Navy did not have mechanical or other skills. This was probably because of: 1) the previous educational opportunities, 2) the generally rural southern society from which Negro enlistees came, and the experience of the Army with all Negro units in World War I. These all-Negro units were labor battalions, used in the most tedious and laborious work and with white officers, most of whom had and exhibited racial prejudice.
Lt Skinner and some of the Sea Cloud crew
I concluded that there had to be a demonstration that Negroes could serve in general ratings effectively. I quickly rejected the idea of an all-Negro unit. First, it was a violation of the proven method of training sailors of putting them on board ship and improving on their boot camp basic skills at sea. Sailors learn from other sailors. The Chief Boatswain's Mate with 25 years of service, two thirds of them at sea, is the best instructor. He can be tough, but the sailor learns from this toughness how to maneuver a small boat alongside, how to paint, how to clean, how to steer, etc. For Negroes to be well qualified, they had to go to sea and go to sea with qualified enlisted men as petty officers and fellow seamen. This meant the ship had to be an integrated ship--black and white at all levels, officers, petty officers and seamen.
And an article about a veteran of that crew, who retired as a Master Chief Boatswains Mate:
BMCM Hammond, USCG(ret)
As captain, Skinner treated all races the same, whether it was for recognition or disobedience. He gave blacks authority over whites as petty officers and chiefs if they proved qualified. . “Mr. Skinner was a very nice man, and a very fair man,” said Hammond. “We were given an opportunity to strike any rate we wanted to,” he added
The experiment lasted little less than a year’s time, and soon the Sea Cloud was en route to a yard and her days as an active ship were numbered. But the mission proved successful, and the role of minorities in the Coast Guard would forever be changed. Skinner had made his point.
The irony of the vessel’s role in racial desegregation for the United States Coast Guard was that the ship was built in Nazi Germany, a society whose very values contradicted the value of racial integration. And for the cost of a cheeseburger, the Sea Cloud was more than worth the investment.
British Pathe
